by Haddock

Anti-Islam and Islamophobic polemic about who or what Muslims worship has taken on many varying forms over the centuries. Some claimed that Muslims worship the Black Stone and the Prophet Muhammad; others have gotten into very silly and involved arguments about Allah being a “Moon-God”; and still others have forwarded the persistent claim that Muslims worship a “demon” called “Allah.”

Take Bryan “deport the Muslims” Fischer, a prominent right-wing Islamophobe who has managed to top even his own bigotry once again. He fervently takes up the age old Islamophobic claims that “Muslims are worshiping a demon,” that “Allah is an extremely powerful demon.” He assures us that he is not trying to be hard on the Muslims, because they have been “deceived” by the “demon-God,” but is simply advocating the “New Testament standpoint” on this matter.

“Allah is an extremely powerful demon. He is a demon God. What Muslims are worshiping is actually a demon. They think they are worshiping God, they’re deceived, they’ve been fooled, so I don’t want to be hard on them, the Muslims have been fooled, they’ve been lied to, they’ve been deceived, they think they are worshiping the true God but they are worshiping a demon-god, this is according to the New Testament. You may disagree with me but there is no question that this is what Christianity teaches. So it’s fine if you take a different view, that’s fine, you’re entitled to your view, this is America; we have freedom of speech and freedom of thought. But from a Christian stand point, from a New Testament stand point, there’s no question that Muslims are worshiping a demon. Allah is a demon God. Remember Jesus himself believed in the existence of Satan, he took Satan very seriously, Satan is a very real being according to the New Testament, he’s out there, not some kind of shadowy, vague, powerless figure but he is the dark ‘prince of the power of the air,’ as the New Testament describes him, so that’s who Muslims are worshiping.”

So, Fischer claims Christianity teaches that there are two gods, a good, true god, presumably “The Father” and a bad “demon-God” named Allah? Surely this is not what Fischer intended to say, but one can be excused for thinking so considering the language he employs.

I’m not sure Fischer’s diatribe can be considered as “according to the New Testament position” on Islam, since it was written some 600 years before Muhammad recited the first verses of the Qur’an. Also, there is the fact that the Aramaic word (the language spoken by Jesus), Alaha is linguistically linked to the Arabic word, Allah.

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Another strange claim about “Allah” put forward by Islam bashers states that “Allah” is the Hebrew word for “curse,” but this is a complete fabrication. Their entire reason for this misinterpretation is that the word for “curse” and the word for “Allah” use the same letters; but ignore the fact that “Allah” has an extra “L”, which means the word for “curse” is actually “Alah”, not “Allah.” Even if the two words are similar, it is important to remember that “Allah” is the Arabic word for God, not Hebrew; let alone the fact that many Middle Eastern Christians and Jews refer to God as “Allah” themselves.

“Some Christians unthinkingly say ‘Allah is not God.’ This is the ultimate blasphemy to Muslims, and furthermore, it is difficult to understand. Allah is the primary Arabic word for God. It means ‘The God.’ There are some minor exceptions. For example, the Bible in some Muslim lands uses a word for God other than Allah (Farsi and Urdu are examples). But for more than five hundred years before Muhammad, the vast majority of Jews and Christians in Arabia called God by the name Allah. How, then, can we say that Allah is an invalid name for God? If it is, to whom have these Jews and Christians been praying?” (emphasis added)

And from the Jewish angle, convert to Judaism and writer/video blogger, Omed Yasher (who is no fan of Islam or Muslims) writes:

“Often among Christians and Jews I hear opposition against use of the term Allah in reference to the Creator – the God of Abraham, on the basis of several misunderstandings and lack of information. One of these is that the name Allah is in Hebrew the word for curse, which is, first of all, patently not true. We’ll begin by showing you what the name Allah looks like in Hebrew.

There are four letters when it’s represented in Hebrew – the Arabic name Allah in Hebrew letters:

(Allah) alef lamed lamed heh.

The Hebrew word for curse is only three letters:

(uh-luh) alef lamed heh.

Clearly they don’t look the same. Although the Arabic name Allah could be written in three letters in Hebrew by inserting a dot, a “dagesh,” inside the “lamed” – middle letter, the “l”

…and that is not how it’s written; …but even if it were, it still wouldn’t mean anything. It wouldn’t mean that Allah means curse any more than the Hebrew name for God “Aloah” means curse.” (emphasis added.)

Furthermore, the Qur’an itself attests that “Allah” is the same deity of the Jews and Christians; but then again, “that’s what the demon-god would say to deceive his followers! Muahahaha!”

“We believe in what has been sent down to us and what was sent down to you. Our God and your God are one and we submit to Him.” (Qur’an, 29:46) (emphasis added)

“Say, “We believe in Allah and what has been sent down to us and what was sent down to Abraham, Ishmael and Isaac and Jacob and the tribes, and what Moses and Jesus and all the Prophets were given by their Lord. We do not differentiate between any of them. We are Muslims submitted to Him.” (Qur’an, 3:84) (emphasis added)

Wouldn’t the following be a strange way for a “demon-god” to demonstrate his evil ways?,

“Those who were expelled from their homes without any right, merely for saying, “Our Lord is Allah.” If Allah had not driven some people back by means of others, monasteries, churches, synagogues and mosques, where Allah’s name is mentioned much, would have been pulled down and destroyed. Allah will certainly help those who help Him – Allah is All-Strong, Almighty.” (Qur’an, 22:40) (emphasis added)

I don’t know about you, but if I were a demon-god that wanted to destroy the “Judeo-Christian” tradition, the first thing I would do is to command my followers to protect “monasteries, churches, synagogues” from being “pulled down and destroyed”; because that’s what you do when you want to destroy something….You protect it…Makes sense to me.

Perplexing isn’t it? It seems this clever, deceiving “demon-God” doesn’t realize that by protecting the houses of worship associated with the “judeo-Christian” tradition that he’s hell-bound to destroy, he is hindering his own evil plan!

Finally, no amount of facts or deeper discussion about where “Allah” comes from, linguistically and historically, or how Muslims and Arabic speakers have understood the word over millennia is bound to affect haters intent on demonizing Islam and Muslims. The simple reason for this is that Islamophobes are grappling with their own historical inheritance; the idea and concept that Muslims and Islam are the complete epitome of the “other”; a people so different than us that their God could “never be the same as our God.”